


The Wolf Charmer

by house_of_lantis



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-30
Updated: 2014-08-30
Packaged: 2018-02-15 08:27:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2222316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/house_of_lantis/pseuds/house_of_lantis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the Argent family, there’s a legend of the wolf-charmer, a master hunter in the cloak of a wolf, who can infiltrate a werewolf’s pack to kill them from within. Derek believes that it was Kate, but Peter knows that the true wolf-charmer is Chris Argent. Meanwhile, the McCall pack has to deal with a rogue werewolf killing and eating people in the Preserves; and Peter is one step closer to becoming an Alpha again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. TEASER: Le Code d’Argent d’Honneur

**Author's Note:**

  * For [moonlettuce (Claire)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claire/gifts).



> Originally posted to my Tumblr: http://theserpentgirl.tumblr.com/post/93835015990/the-wolf-charmer-part-1

_We Hales have a long and bloody history with the Argents._

-      Peter Hale

  

**_October 31, 1589_ **

**_Cologne Castle, Germany_ **

“Pitre Hayl, you are hereby accused of consorting with the Devil and fornicating with your own flesh and blood. You have confessed to being a werewolf and murdering and consuming the flesh of thirty humans, including your own son. You are to be put on the wheel where your flesh will be torn from your body, your limbs broken to prevent your return from the grave, beheaded, and burned on a pyre. Your demon daughter will be flayed and strangled and burned alongside you. Do you have any last words before your punishment?”

Pitre looked up and sneered. “You can hunt us down, but you’ll never kill all of us, d’Argent.”

“Abominations like you and your kind shall never walk this earth again for as long as a d’Argent lives,” Alain d’Argent promised, narrowing his eyes at the werewolf demon.

Pitre laughed and then spat on the stone floor. He shifted his blue eyes to the young man standing beside Alain. “You will never be free, Jean-Christof.”

Jean-Christof d’Argent looked down at the man kneeling on the courtyard of Cologne Castle. Wild and dirty, subdued with the ring of Wolfsbane, and he was still full of pride and strength.

“I am not the one about to go to his death.”

The makeshift pile of wood caught and blazed high with flames, thick gray smoke filling the courtyard.

“Death is my freedom; pray, what will be yours, Christof?” Pitre said, baring his fangs, eyes flashing amber.

Alain nodded to his men as they dragged the struggling werewolf to the wheel. He smiled as he watched them strip the animal down, tying his wrists and ankles to the wheel spokes. The animal growled and snapped his teeth at the men, but he was too weak to fight, the small blue flowers keeping his demonic strength at bay.

“Tomorrow, you will return to Paris and take your new place in the King’s court on behalf of our family,” Alain said, casually, as Pitre began to scream. “You will use your influence with the Cardinal and ensure our continued favor.”

“Yes, father.”

Jean-Christof kept his face carefully blank. He forced himself to watch as the men took Pitre’s flesh apart, piece by piece, deep red soaking the gray stones of the courtyard.

“One day, you will wear the title of  _Le Maître de la Chasse_.”

The Master of the Hunt.

“I will wear it proudly.”

Pitre howled as they broke his bones with the flat end of an axe; Jean-Christof wished he would seek oblivion. He would not be able to witness Pitre’s suffering for much longer, his stomach churning and bile filling his mouth. He swallowed it back, gritting his teeth.

“The d’Argent name will be held in the greatest esteem in France; the  _usurper_  king himself will open his treasury to pay for our hunts. We will cleanse the world of these beasts.”

“It would be wiser to work through the king’s right hand man, Maximilien de Bethune.”

Alain gave him a sidelong glance, a smile on his lips. “So you have been paying attention to my lessons.”

Jean-Christof closed his eyes when they cut off Pitre’s manhood.

He felt Alain’s fingers pinch his chin, turning his face. He opened his eyes and stared at his father, seeing his upper lip curled in disgust. “You soiled yourself with that animal; and while I praise you for sacrificing yourself on the dirty task of gaining his trust and his love so that we could find his den and his pack, your compassion for their kind is your weakness. Tell me, son, did you enjoy the beast? Enjoy giving your body to him, knowing that he murdered your mother and your four sisters?”

“I did my duty,” he said, jerking his father’s hand away.

Alain chuckled, darkly. “Yes, your duty. Well done, son. See the fruits of your labor.” He waved his hand to the courtyard where the men had chopped off Pitre’s head, laughing as they tossed it around. “Pity that he didn’t last longer. I should’ve allowed you to kill him and claim his pelt for your bed.” Alain turned to walk into the castle. “A reminder to you about your duty to the d’Argent name,  _loup charmeur_.”

Wolf-charmer. Only his father’s closest of advisors knew Jean-Christof’s true role in the family. He was gifted with the ability to tame any animal he encountered. His father’s men had trained him to understand and apply animal behavior; to show dominance or to show submission, to gain trust, to earn love, and to attack mercilessly and efficiently. Since he was a boy, he had been taught to kill with his hands.

There was a time when Jean-Christof had viciously skinned a werewolf in his wolf form and proudly worn their fur on his shoulders, feared and respected by his father’s mercenaries as he led them on the hunt. It filled him with shame and guilt now. Pitre Hayl was a werewolf, but he wasn’t the werewolf who had killed their family. He and his daughter lived peacefully, hunting only forest animals and keeping to themselves. He had changed Jean-Christof; taught him that there was no need for this war, that werewolves and humans could exist, balanced in nature. Pitre was not an abomination; he was a creature of God. How many had Jean-Christof killed in the name of God, the Church, the King, or his father? How much innocent blood stained the d’Argent name? And how much more must be shed to assuage his father’s bloodlust?

He could not live with this dishonor. As the last d’Argent, he would not let his name be brought low. He couldn’t save Pitre, but he could create a code of honor to remember his blood-soaked past. A code to only hunt and kill monsters that threatened them; a code to keep the d’Argent name honorable, something to be proud of.

_We hunt those who hunt us._

He watched as they dropped Pitre’s torn and broken body on the pyre, the stench of his burning flesh filling his nose. He would never be able to sleep again after this day. 


	2. ACT ONE: The New Threats

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted to my Tumblr: http://theserpentgirl.tumblr.com/post/93882770025/the-wolf-charmer-part-2

_Never divide your army in two and never fight two fronts at the same time._

-      General Sun Tzu

 

**_Night_ **

**_The Preserves_ **

**_Beacon Hills, California_ **

 

“Run! Keep running!” He yelled, holding their daughter on his back, trying to keep the flashlight on the forest floor so that he could see where he was running.

“Ohmygod, it’s behind us,” the woman said, gripping the hand of their son as they continued to run through the woods.

 

He heard her fall and cry out, stopping and turning to make sure that she was okay. They wouldn’t be able to make it out of the woods alive, not together. He set his daughter on the ground and helped the woman back on her feet. They heard the loud growl echo in the forest; the wolf was near. There was no way that they’d all be able to escape.

“Take the kids and run, Maggie. Don’t stop for any reason. Don’t look back,” he said, urgently.

“Robert, we can keep—“

“No, daddy, don’t leave us!”

“Take them and go!” He shouted, pushing her by the shoulder. “Go!”

“We can make it together,” Maggie insisted, shaking her head.

“Daddy, I’m scared! I don’t want to run anymore!”

Robert ran his hands down his daughter’s arms, trying to soothe her fears, kissing her forehead. “It’s going to be okay, honey, just go with mommy and Jack, just keep running, okay?”

“No, dad, we can run together!”

“You have to watch out for your mom and your sister,” he said to his son, hugging him tightly. “Don’t look back. Keep your flashlight on the ground so you don’t trip. Just keep running, go towards the street, it’s just two miles that way. You can do it, son.”

Jack nodded, his mouth turned down in a deep frown.

“Robert—“ 

“For god’s sake, please, go! Run!”

He watched as she took their hands, running into the woods. He panted roughly, moving his light on the forest floor, looking for something – anything – that he could use to keep a wolf at bay. There was nothing but some sticks, too thin to be a weapon, until he found a broken hunk of branch, about as thick as he could find. He picked it up, hefting the weight of it in his hand. It felt heavy and dense; maybe if he was lucky, he’d be able to get in one good hit to the face, just enough to knock it out so he could get away.

The growl sounded closer. He moved his flashlight into the trees, but realized that he was just giving away his position. He turned off the light and hid behind a thick tree, trying to listen to the wolf through the sound of his own blood rushing in his ears.

There was another rumbling growl; it sounded wet and hungry. He heard the rustling and turned, the heavy thump of paws snapping sticks and dried leaves as it ran towards him. The large black wolf with the glowing white eyes leaped at him and Robert screamed as he fell, sharp fangs buried into the side of his neck, his blood spraying across the snout of the wolf.

He felt the fangs rip out a hunk of meat from his neck and Robert tried in vain to hit the wolf with the flashlight in his hand. He screamed again when he felt claws dig across his belly, tearing his stomach open. He screamed with his last breath, shaking in pain as he heard the wolf snarl, tearing his intestines from his body.

 

**_Present Day_ **

**_The Preserves_ **

Sheriff John Stilinski parked his patrol vehicle at the end of the clearing and stepped out of the car, taking a moment to observe his deputies at work. The coroner’s station wagon was parked nearby, the clearing roped off with yellow tape. The foot traffic in the Preserves would make it nearly impossible to track for prints; and while most of his deputies were trained to do basic search and rescue in the woods, they weren’t experienced trackers.

Deputy Jordan Parrish was standing with two men dressed in running clothes, shoulders hunched in as they tried not to look at the body. Parrish turned to look at him and John motioned for the Deputy to come over and fill him in.

“The joggers found the victim at around 6:30 AM and called it in. We’ve finished getting their statements and asked them to be available for any follow up questions. We found the campsite about two miles east of here. It looked like an animal had gone through it, slashed everything up. Deputy Ross found the car in the parking lot, registration was inside.” He handed the evidence bag to John. “Robert Wade of 623 Walcott Avenue.”

“Have you sent a deputy out to the house?”

“Yes, no one was in residence, though.”

John nodded, walking towards the body. Even from the distance, he could see the ground was covered in dark blotches of rusty red; a dozen small yellow flags noting the placement of evidence.

“We found a wallet and a bag at the campsite. Robert and Margaret Wade. Two children, a boy and a girl,” Parrish said, handing him the evidence bag with the driver’s license and family photos. “We found toys and two small sleeping bags.”

“Anything on the wife and kids?”

Parrish sighed and shook his head. “Not yet.”

“Get the K-9 units out there and keep looking.”

“We’ve got the deputies making a perimeter search now.”

John walked to the yellow tape and waited patiently for the county medical examiner to finish her work. She stood up and stepped lightly around the evidence flags, making her way to him.

“Good morning, John,” she said, snapping off the latex glove, holding out her hand.

“Bev, it’s good to see you,” he said, shaking it firmly. “Dr Beverly Hansen, Deputy Jordan Parrish. He’ll be taking the lead on this investigation.”

“Deputy.”

“Ma’am,” Parrish said, shaking her hand.

John watched the two of them share a genuine smile of familiarity; he raised his eyebrow for a moment and wondered if his deputy hadn’t already met the attractive and  _single_  medical examiner before.

“Can you fill me in on what you found?”

“Body temp shows that he was attacked and killed around 1 AM, but I won’t know for certain until I get him back to the morgue. From my initial examination, it was an animal attack,” she said, frowning slightly. She waved for them to follow her to the body.

“Was it a bear?” He said, ducking under the yellow tape and following her, making sure that he stepped gingerly past the evidence flags and ignoring the pieces of human body and flesh on the forest floor.

Beverly shook her head. “The claw marks aren’t that of a bear; and to be honest, I’m a little puzzled. It looks like the mountain lion attacks from a couple of years ago, but…I know it’s improbable but I’d say that it was a wolf, but California doesn’t have a wolf population that I’m aware of.”

John sighed, frowning. That was not what he wanted to hear.

“Bev, would you mind if I have Dr Alan Deaton consult on this case?”

She grinned, raising her eyebrow. “Of course; Alan is always welcomed to visit my morgue. We’ll transport the victim to county; I should have my preliminary report ready for you in a few hours.”

“Thank you,” he said, walking to the yellow tape and ducking under it.

“Mountain lion?” Parrish said, looking at him.

“Parrish, can you call Deaton and ask him to meet me at the morgue? I need to take off,” John said, heading for his car. He pulled out his cell phone and scrolled down to the contact he needed. He pressed the call button but it went straight to voicemail. “Chris, it’s John. I need to see you right away. I’m heading back to my office if you can meet me. This is urgent.”

“Sheriff Stilinski!” Parrish shouted, waving his hand and running to the car.

John looked out the opened window. “What is it?”

“They just found a woman and two small children about a quarter mile away,” Parrish said, shaking his head. “Deputy Blake said that it was not pretty. Sheriff, I know I haven’t been here that long, but what the hell kind of animal would do this?”

“One that needs to be put down,” he said, starting the engine. 


End file.
